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Obese Irish teenagers may face stomach stapling

OBESE Irish teenagers could be forced to undergo stomach stapling to save their lives, according to a leading obesity expert.

Donal O’Shea, an endocrinologist and member of the National Taskforce on Obesity, said that unless Ireland’s childhood obesity epidemic is curbed, gastric reduction surgery, currently restricted to adults, may be performed on morbidly obese teens.

“It is the doomsday scenario that we would all want to avoid completely,” said O’Shea, who runs Ireland’s first dedicated obesity clinic at Loughlinstown hospital in Dublin.

“We are eight years behind America, and if the epidemic is not addressed, then we will also be operating on adolescents. It is the last thing that you want to do, but it is the only thing that works when people are morbidly obese.”

Earlier this month, the taskforce reported that 300,000 Irish children are overweight or obese and warned that the figure would rise by an additional